[lemedico]

Congratulations on your new car! wish you many happy and safe miles.

Beware of a new theft in town, door lock sensors. Lost both of mine and honda quotes 6500 per side in estimated costs!

[hotspot]

Originally Posted by Redline6800

A great car is more than the sum of its parts - the City still excels in this aspect.
What a superb review hotspot! my compliments.

Thanks for reading the review and compliments.

Originally Posted by irdevanand

It is like marrying the same girl again !!. I can tell this for sure because i did the same. Infact same color choice. Silver replaced with White.

Whoa! That's a great coincidence. In fact, i know quite a few people who have upgraded their Honda City to a new Generation Honda city. That's the Legacy i am talking about in the review.

Sorry to hear about your first car. Wishing you many more happy miles in the current car.

Originally Posted by ChiragM

Once a Honda customer, always a Honda customer.

It is disappointing to read about your experience at the Honda dealership. As you pointed out, you have no other option as it is the only Honda dealership in your city. Considering that you are a return customer, they should have provided a much better service to you. Hope another Honda dealership comes up soon.

Oh, and the best pic in the thread is the last one where your dog is posing between the two cars.

Thank you for your kind words.
About dealership experience, I have seen same sorry attitude of salesperson across dealerships in tier 2 city like mine. Most of the brands have only one outlet in the city so dealer always have monopoly. Sales people are poorly trained. Ethics and knowledge of car are lacking seriously.We had almost similar experience when we purchased Mahindra XUV. In conclusion, as written in the review, from next time i will make sure to get everything in written. Other than that, we BHPians have enough knowledge at hand to make an informed choice.

And yes my dog does like to pose. I agree with you completely, it is the best picture of the whole lot.

Originally Posted by lemedico

Congratulations on your new car! wish you many happy and safe miles.
Beware of a new theft in town, door lock sensors. Lost both of mine and honda quotes 6500 per side in estimated costs!

Thank you, lemedico. Thieves stealing request sensors is a news to me.
Our cars are always parked safely inside our home. Outside we don't have much control on these petty crimes, but i make sure to park car in safe parking spots. Hoping this doesn't happen with my car. Thanks for sharing.

[ShivrajG]

Congratulations on your new car!
Very well penned post and detailing. I have always loved the smoothness of the Honda Engine, though I am more of a Diesel fan (both of my Vehicles being Diesels).
Honda cars have always been a there in my list to-own vehicles and most probably I will own a Honda soon.
Thank you very much for this post and wish you safe and happy miles with new beauty.

[Redline6800]

Originally Posted by hotspot

About dealership experience, I have seen same sorry attitude of salesperson across dealerships in tier 2 city like mine. Most of the brands have only one outlet in the city so dealer always have monopoly. Sales people are poorly trained. Ethics and knowledge of car are lacking seriously.We had almost similar experience when we purchased Mahindra XUV. In conclusion, as written in the review, from next time i will make sure to get everything in written. Other than that, we BHPians have enough knowledge at hand to make an informed choice.

Sorry to hear about your dealership experience as this is really important not only at purchase but over course of ownership.

My my experience with Whitefield Honda in BLR since 2000 has been truly excellent and a major reason for my love for Honda.

Friends I referred to the showroom were also happy - except for the most recent one who had an issue with the Digipad and was unhappy with the way the situation was handled.

Does the dealership benefit from being nice to a customer? Yes !

When we returned to buy a Brio in 2012 for my girlfriend (now wife) - I was surprised with the warmth with which we were treated. After all discounts, the day before we picked up the car, I was told that we would be getting after-market parking sensors complimentary ( I had not asked for this).

Have referred a total of 4 friends till date - who all picked up new cars - the first purchased a 10th anniversary Dolphin shape City in 2008, then an ex-colleague got a Jazz X in 2010/11 and two others who brought a 4th gen pre-facelift City VX AT in 2015 and 4th gen facelift City V AT in 2017 respectively.

All of us still have our respective cars

I must also add that despite complaints about Honda quality, our 6 year old Brio has held up very well as have all the other cars mentioned above.

[hotspot]

Originally Posted by ShivrajG

Congratulations on your new car!
Very well penned post and detailing. I have always loved the smoothness of the Honda Engine, though I am more of a Diesel fan (both of my Vehicles being Diesels).
Honda cars have always been a there in my list to-own vehicles and most probably I will own a Honda soon.

Thank you ShivrajG for your appreciation. I wish you own a Honda soon. My recommendation would be to go for Ivtec and manual gearbox combination.

Originally Posted by Redline6800

Sorry to hear about your dealership experience as this is really important not only at purchase but over course of ownership.

My my experience with Whitefield Honda in BLR since 2000 has been truly excellent and a major reason for my love for Honda.

I totally agree with you. Dealership experience does matter a lot in car purchasing. It can make or break a deal. My experience with current dealership was "MEH!" as written on the title to that post. It was not drastically bad but it was not good either. At least sales person accepted his lies and tried to amend things albeit after some harsh words.
In another instance when we had gone to look at Mahindra XUV, sales person ignorantly told us Opulent Purple Colour is not available in variants other than W10. Later, on taking up this issues with higher ups in dealership we came to know sales person was just saying that because he had not seen Purple car in other variant since the time he had joined dealership.

Dealerships due to lack of competition are not customer oriented. Sales people show quite indifferent attitude towards customer and show as if i don't buy car soon there are plenty waiting in line. I accept one flaw on my side. I do not act indifferent and give away very easily. Sales guy easily senses our eagerness to buy the car and takes us for a ride.

I am happy to see you having great dealership experience and i hope dealerships in my city also come up to that standard in coming days.

As for cars you recommended to your friends i would say, you cannot go wrong in suggesting Honda. Thankfully cars also proved themselves in your case. We never give enough credit to Brio. It is great little city car which is well sorted mechanically. A bit of let down are bland interiors(which were subsquently improved in facelift). We also have a Brio in our extended family. Driving that car always brings smile on my face.

[irdevanand]

Yup. In fact the only other car that appealed to me was the BMW 320d. Anything in-between (from city to 320d) was only as good as Honda city in terms of aspiration to own.

Originally Posted by hotspot

Whoa! That's a great coincidence. In fact, i know quite a few people who have upgraded their Honda City to a new Generation Honda city. That's the Legacy i am talking about in the review.
.

[bhpfaninblr]

Originally Posted by hotspot

Disclaimer

• Next came a False Boot car, modest Silver Tata Indigo GLX. A car which only impressed us with acres and acres of space it had. Other than that it was scrap on wheels. Lots and lots of problem starting from mechanical to build quality. In a few years in spite of being in Dry environment (Read Desert) throughout its small life panels started rusting. A big let down for us and we decided never to buy a Tata again in spite of having great respect for The Man. Car was sold for obvious reasons.

One more example of the poor quality of the Indigo. No cars have caused Indians as much suffering as the Indigo. GTO also had to experience the headache of owning an Indigo.

Congrats on the Honda City. The 1.5L petrol is truly a gem of an engine. What an awesome ownership report!

[hotspot]

Originally Posted by bhpfaninblr

One more example of the poor quality of the Indigo. No cars have caused Indians as much suffering as the Indigo. GTO also had to experience the headache of owning an Indigo.

Congrats on the Honda City. The 1.5L petrol is truly a gem of an engine. What an awesome ownership report!

Thank you bhpfaninblr for your appreciating words on review. Current Honda City's USP are IVtec Engine and space.

On the other note:

We bought indigo with lots of expectations, but it did cause us only sufferings.That car was a big let down and headache. It was actually scrap on wheels. Almost all of its parts gave problem during our short ownership of 3 years. There were rattles in every panel of car. Within two years doors and bottom frame started rusting. Things took a much ugly turn when during one non routine visit to service station we were informed that engine mounts have wasted off and engine might fall off the car anytime. Totally surprised we went to check this at showroom to find that actually two of the front mounts were almost gone. We raised a lot of hue and cry and took matters upto higher ups, but nobody bat an eyelid towards our plight. Finally we were able to sell the car at a reasonable price. From that time we firmly decided not to buy any tata car again.

Thats why, while looking for a seven seater SUV withing a budget of 20 lacs we looked at only two options i.e. Xuv 500 and innova crysta and chose the former. Tata Hexa was never brought into consideration.

[car FANATICUS]

Congratulations for your new car. I had NHC 2006 model that I sold in 2013 and bought Renault Duster. Still miss the engine refinement and ease of driving. Except for the ground clearance I never faced any trouble with the car. bought of 7 Lac and sold for 3.5 Lac after putting 80K on ODO in 7 years, that too with UP number in Bangalore.

[hotspot]

Originally Posted by car FANATICUS

Congratulations for your new car.

Thanks for the kind words. Then one issue you had with NHC has been resolved and car doesn't scrape anymore. But overall quality has taken a hit along with rise in ex-showroom price. In terms of resale value i think you hit a jackpot because we had to sell our car at a much lower price than yours. Duster is also a great car with superior ride quality and SUV feel over the honda city. But i have heard from relatives about higher cost of maintenance and costly spares for the car. Hoping you not facing the same issues.


A small update on the car:
Nothing significant to report about the car. It is performing as expected, with fuel efficiency hovering around 12 kmpl in city with AC On 100 percent of time.
Car went for its 1st free service and came out with zero damage on wallet.

[KaranP]

Hey Hotspot,

I have a 2009 City V A/T currently, and I think it's about time I moved on.

Since the past 2 months I've been doing my research and established that going in for an upgrade (read likes of Elantra etc.) was just not possible, they're way too expensive.

As I would like to call myself a driving enthusiast and never really felt let down by my existing car, I would at least expect similar outright performance, If not more from my next car.

I drove the Polo GT TSI and wasn't really blown away. Yes the suspension felt like it could take some abuse and the gearshifts were quick, acceleration didn't feel better than my existing car. Also I felt 11.5 lakhs on road Mumbai was a bit steep for what the car basically is and what it offers.

The only other alternative I could look at is the City CVT. I know CVTs and I know their inherent weaknesses, but I read that Honda has done a really good job mating the engine to an above average CVT.

So I visited the showroom and asked for a test drive. Everything about the car felt better - noise isolation, suspension, suspension noise, brake feel (guess it's just the servo/sensitivity adjustment), steering felt lighter but provided good feedback, sound from the speakers, overall fit and finish etc. BUT, the CVT really let me down.

Firstly, I could hear and feel a thud while shifting from N to D. Even while standing firmly on the brakes, there was a significant shudder from the gearbox. Also, on flooring the A pedal, the surge we felt from our old car during kickdown is just not there in the CVT. I know you're supposed to wait for a bit till the gearbox gets into it's stride, but that thrust never came! I kept waiting with my foot on the floor and the revs maxed out at 6000+ rpm but it didn't really ever seem to hook!

I've done my research about the 0-100 times and almost every source tells me the CVT is quicker than the old torque converter unit.

Could you shine some light on your experiences and how you feel it compares to your old City?

[hotspot]

Originally Posted by KaranP

Could you shine some light on your experiences and how you feel it compares to your old City?

Hey Karan,
You seem to be in the same boat i was a few months ago. We do share similar thoughts on most of the things but i differ with you on some.
Firstly, i was clearly blown away by Polo GT TSi performance. That is still best hot hatch i have driven as yet. But i do agree spending upwards of 10 lakhs on a car with old, bland interiors and less space is not justified. It would be a great second car to own if one has that amount of money spare.
Honda's CVT mating with engine is spot on for sedate drivers. As you must have read in my review and official review, as you put pedal to metal all that ivtec fun is gone with great acoustics but no movement of scenery around.
Comparing both gearboxes, i feel AT revs high and engine sounds harsh in lower gears i.e. in 1st and 2nd gears whereas CVT is quieter and refined. Secondly AT is jerky in regular use where as CVT is seamless. Thirdly poor fuel efficiency of AT will always be less than CVT.
On the performance front i do agree on the whole performance aspect and i still prefer driving dynamics and gearbox combo of old car. Kickdown is present in CVT albeit very mild. It is nothing compared to drop down two gears of AT bringing the engine to high rev range. More so do check if test drive car wasn't in ECO mode accidentally. That also subdues the experience. But considering the bigger picture of more functionality, better fuel efficiency, quieter cabin and more upmarket car i still believe New Honda City is overall an upgrade.

If you still feel CVT combo is not meant for you i would suggest you give Hyundai Verna a test drive. It has got Torque converter with a powerful engine. If seat space is not much of an issue then it trumps city in all aspects of quality inside out.


Please ping me if you need some specifics into the new car or any confusions.


Happy Hunting!

[city2491]

Originally Posted by hotspot

Small Observations/ Features

• Trunk lid doesn’t pop on pressing boot release button on remote. You have to press the sensor on the lid to open.

The trunk lid does in fact open on pressing the boot lid button, but the only thing is you have to hold it for three seconds. Event I used to think both my remotes have some issue but I got it by playing around.

Cheers!

[hotspot]

Originally Posted by city2491

The trunk lid does, in fact, open on pressing the boot lid button, but the only thing is you have to hold it for three seconds.

Thanks, City2491 for pointing it out. It is my bad that I didn't edit that post. Discovered this one when I was with a friend in his Vento and he showed me the way to open boot using the remote. Correct me if I am wrong but I think its true for all cars with the boot release button on the remote.

[city2491]

Originally Posted by hotspot

Thanks, City2491 for pointing it out. It is my bad that I didn't edit that post. Discovered this one when I was with a friend in his Vento and he showed me the way to open boot using the remote. Correct me if I am wrong but I think its true for all cars with the boot release button on the remote.

I think it's a safety feature. In case you accidentally press the boot release button you won't have to go to the boot and manually shut it. And accidentally pressing it would allow items to be stolen from the boot.